King Neptune Ceremony

A grand world voyage is not complete without a King Neptune ceremony. Legend has it that if a ship crosses the equator and does not appropriately honor King Neptune, bad things will happen. On this cruise we held the ceremony after the fourth time we crossed the equator. Because it took us so long to get around to doing the ceremony, they needed a lot of “pollywogs” to sacrifice. Nobody on the crew who is a first-timer is exempt from being a pollywog. Not even a medical officer.

Of course we have King Neptune and his beautiful bride, and the judge (who writes the script for the ceremony and who is always played by the cruise director). There are lots of “nurses” who are responsible for torturing the pollywogs, smearing them with meringue. Once each batch of pollywogs is suitably lathered, the ship’s captain and his fellow officers get to decide if the pollywogs should be saved or go into the drink. The pollywogs are always happy when they get a thumbs down, meaning they are to jump into the pool, because if they are saved, they get to let the sun bake the meringue into their clothes, hair and skin.

Despite the fact that the party is in honor of King Neptune, the star of the show is always the janitress, played by Barbara Haenni our travel consultant.

Even though we’ve been to these ceremonies before, they are always a lot of fun. We always welcome an opportunity to laugh, and this ceremony never fails to provide many such opportunities. More pictures in this album.